In A Bar Very Much Like This
by Red Fiona
Summary: Their story began in a bar very much like this. The details were different, of course.


Title: In A Bar Very Much Like This

Author: Red Fiona

Fandom: Star Trek XI

Characters: Amanda Grayson, Sarek, Spock

Pairing: Amanda Grayson/Sarek

Ratings/Warnings/Etc: PG het fic. A very belated response to a Ladyfest10 prompt. Upon googling, it turns out the prompt is taken from the Dresden Dolls song 'Delilah'. The fic is not related to the song in any way.

Prompt: Prompt: In this same bar

Where you slammed  
Down your hand  
And said, "Amanda, I'm in love."

Summary: Their story began in a bar very much like this. The details were different, of course.

* * *

The details were different, of course. Sarek, son of Skon, did not slam his hands on bar tables in San Francisco, or anywhere else. He most certainly didn't say, "damn it, Amanda, listen to me" as one of her former boyfriends had. The poor boy had been so confused when she just got up and walked out after he said that.

No, they were sitting, talking, in a bar after Sarek had invited her to a reading of Earth poetry, because he believed she would be an invaluable aid to his understanding of the differences between it and the Vulcan equivalent. She hadn't realised that he was asking her out on a date until afterwards. And they say Vulcans are bad at reading emotional cues.

She'd met him while she was studying Vulcan poetry. He was working at the embassy, not as a cultural attach or anything, but he was the only person at the embassy that had studied poetry to any great depth. She had found the Vulcans reserved, not unapproachable or aloof. She wondered, privately, if it was because it was very hard to explain your love poetry when you claim to be purely logical. Sarek was not that different, to begin with, understandably possibly worried that she had some prurient interest (he'd told her, much later, that Vulcans found something distasteful in the Human interest in sex). When she'd asked as many questions about scansion and form as she had about content, he'd realised her interest was truly academic and had opened up on the topic.

They'd spent time together, time she enjoyed, time she hoped he'd enjoyed, because back then, she'd found it so hard to read him. Not now, she'd had time to learn him, understood what Sarek meant when he used a particular quote or saying. And maybe she'd found herself wistfully thinking what she'd do if he'd been Simon, son of Steve, instead of a Vulcan diplomat, but everyone was allowed their fantasies.

And he hadn't said "I'm in love." Vulcans have a concept, which described the act of sacrificing one's innermost desires for the greater good, and Sarek said that not to do anything about his feelings about her would be to turn his back on that which would be the most illogical, and therefore wrong, thing any Vulcan could do. He'd chosen that phrasing deliberately, because he made it clear that it wouldn't necessarily be easy, not that any relationship was. He spoke about Vulcan traditions, and how some Vulcans were bound by them rather than strengthened by them. He wanted her to know that if she didn't want to be involved with him because of that he would understand.

She said she'd try and see. He accepted that too.

He tried to prepare her for what would happen when they arrived on Vulcan, but bless him, she didn't think anything could have done. Sarek did his best to shield her from the worst of it, but he couldn't be everywhere. He'd been drawn into an argument with a Vulcan elder. All that Amanda could make out was Sarek arguing that 'it's never been done is not a logical argument'.

Another, even older Vulcan, a woman, moved towards her, and spoke to her, "it's your future that they're talking about. Do you not feel that you should say something?"

"Until I understand the situation fully it is better to stay silent."

"And if complete understanding is impossible?"

"Then I will speak when it is required."

Sarek had seen Amanda speaking to the woman, and raced over with panic, or the Vulcan equivalent.

He spoke in his most polite Vulcan. "Hello most honoured aunt. Thank you for your presence."

"Thank you for your invitation. It has been a pleasure to meet Amanda. I admire her reasoning." Amanda bowed in thanks. It was the start of a long night, with every Vulcan who could come up with an excuse for dropping by doing so.

By the time tradition dictated everyone should leave, even Sarek looked tired.

"I am sorry about that. I expected my close family to be interested, but not everyone else."

Amanda smiled. "I appreciate their curiosity."

"Thank you for being so polite about it."

Then again, were Sarek's family any worse than Amanda's when they'd gone to meet them? She'd forgotten how large her family had grown. And the children were loud, loud for the sake of being loud, in a way that Vulcan children weren't, not that they couldn't be loud when they had a reason for it.

Sarek had tolerated it with a polite expression on his face that hadn't faltered no matter how loud it got.

She turned to face him as they walked back to the nearest transporter pad. "I should have warned you more about how loud my family get."

"Not a problem. It was ... bracing." She looked at him, disbelieving. "I am supposed to search out different experiences." She saw him purse his lips in that way that Vulcans did when they found something funny but had no excuse to laugh about it because it would be illogical. She laughed for him instead, talking his hand as they walked in the moonlight. That was the night she fell in love with him. It wasn't that she hadn't been attracted to him before, but it was that night she realised that this was someone she could spend the rest of her life with, and who wanted to spend it with her, despite everything.

And it all stemmed from a date in a bar like this. Not this bar. She doubted the other bar even existed any more, it was nearly thirty years ago and bars didn't last that long. It was rare enough that she visited one. Vulcans didn't have bars, they didn't really have a culture around alcohol the same way most human cultures, or certainly the one Amanda had been brought up in, did. So sometimes, when they were back on Earth, or another suitable planet, Amanda used to go out to bars. Not to get drunk, or anything, the amount of time she'd spent on Vulcan had reduced her tolerance for alcohol, but just to get a feel for the atmosphere again.

They were on Earth for Spock's graduation from Starfleet. Or she was. Sarek was pretending that it was complete coincidence that he'd been assigned to Earth for this six month span and that he hadn't asked for it in any way, nor had he pulled any strings to make sure he was one of the Starfleet representatives at the ceremony. There were people who believed Vulcans when they said they didn't lie. These people weren't married to them.

Her husband and her son were both being pig-headed and stubborn, Sarek more than Spock. She understood why Spock had chosen Starfleet over the Vulcan Science Academy, it wasn't just an emotional reaction. And so what if it was. All the Vulcans Amanda had met had been polite and courteous to her, but she'd always remained not entirely of Vulcan, while Spock, Spock was Spock, son of Sarek, child of Vulcan, but they'd always treated him slightly differently from other, wholly Vulcan, children. It wouldn't have been any better on Earth, it would have been his Vulcan heritage that was looked on askance there.

Spock, she thought, had recognised this, and decided that the best way to deal with that sort of obstacle was not to injure himself running straight at it, but manoeuvring round it. To her that really was the more logical solution but she hadn't said that to Sarek. Instead she'd tried to gently coax his view around to her way of thinking, and would continue to do so, because, as Sarek had said, 'it's never been done' is not a logical reason not to do something. It would take time, but she'd do it, with the mixture of logic and persistence she'd learnt since all this began. In a bar very much like this.


End file.
